Me, that John Deere tractor and trailer to the right, a bow saw, a pruning saw, a pole saw, and 10 months. That’s what it took to clean up the consequences of last October’s snowpocalypse. The mound to the left of the tractor is the output of all that work, and the second photo is one of the more painful examples of how much damage was done, especially to our apple trees. Fortunately we have many of them, but as you can see this one lost 1/3 of its main trunk, and about the same amount of its upper foliage.

Susan tried to convince me to get a chainsaw after a couple of months of seeing how much work was involved, but I need my cardio and exercise, and derive a fair bit of satisfaction in this kind of work. I’m happy to more or less be finished though – everything’s cleared up aside from a few branches too high up for me to get at with the pole saw and too difficult to climb to, and a few that we hope will survive even if they don’t look like it.